TAP Portugal: Why Lufthansa Outbid Air France-KLM

Many experts were waiting for Air France-KLM, but it was ultimately Lufthansa who beat the French group in the duel over the takeover of TAP Air Portugal. On October 13, the Portuguese government officially designated the German group as buyer, for the modest sum of €1.2 billion. It will thus take 44.9% of the capital of the Lusitanian carrier, adding a new trophy to its hunting list after Swiss (2006), Austrian Airlines (2008), Brussels Airlines (2016) and ITA Airways (2025).

“I was surprised by the choice of the Lufthansa group,” judges Paul Chiambaretto, air transport expert and director of the Pégase chair. “We could have imagined that the offer made by Air France-KLM would be preferred, in particular by the guarantees which were offered to the Portuguese government by allowing them to become shareholders of the Franco-Dutch group and to play a stronger role in governance,” he further believes. However, he also puts forward a bundle of small advantages which contributed to tipping the choice of the Portuguese government. “On the Lufthansa side, the industrial project was a little better put together, with more guarantees for installations on Portuguese territory, particularly in terms of maintenance or innovation,” he explains. The Lufthansa group also has more experience than Air France-KLM in integrating other airlines. And there is also another reason which is very simple: TAP is already part of Star Alliance [of which Lufthansa is a founding member]. It is therefore used to interacting with Lufthansa, and to having the same standards, the same commercial agreements. »

Machine-translated from French